


Wicked Exceedingly

by Anonymous



Series: Performance reviews [1]
Category: Good Omens (TV)
Genre: Bugs & Insects, M/M, Metaphysical Sex, Non-Permanent injury - Freeform, Nonnies Made Me Do It, Other, Overstimulation, PWP, Public Sex, Sadism, dubcon, noncon, thinly-veiled excuses for porn
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-11
Updated: 2019-09-11
Packaged: 2020-10-14 08:30:04
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,909
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20597774
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/
Summary: Crowley is called upon to demonstrate how he corrupted the people of Sodom and Gomorrah.





	Wicked Exceedingly

At first Crowley thought he'd tripped, as was the natural consequence of a certain quantity of date wine. The world had not been very old before he had discovered that sufficient quantity of wine was enough to render everything horizontal, or at least perpendicular. Before his sodden brain could catch onto the fact that he hadn't hit the floor yet, his stomach began to revolt, and that, too, could have been ascribed to the wine, and the rotten egg smell might have been due to the quality of establishment, but the raging heat of hellfire couldn't be explained by any of those. Thought and recognition and _ohshit_ began to trickle through, and the panicked realization that he was really falling very fast and should probably get out his wings and do something about it. 

And that, of course, was when he hit the ground. 

'Ground' being a far more metaphysical concept in Hell than on Earth, he did not discorporate. It still hurt like the dickens; it was Hell.

The wine had come with him. (Had he been sober enough to taste that last jug, he'd have thought it deserved it.) Nonetheless, as he looked up from his impact crater (scored 2/10, they'd all seen much more impressive craters caused by falls from much, much further Up) and took in the number of Dukes, Counts, Viscounts, Barons, Lords, and other assorted nobility standing around him, Crowley found himself experiencing a peculiar kind of clear-headedness. If asked to walk in a straight line, he would not have made one crooked step. He wouldn't have made any steps. He was paralyzed with terror. 

There were even Princes in this audience. His gaze kept snagging as he counted them, caught by the horror of their presence. He would have looked away, but looking elsewhere was more dangerous. Elsewhere was--elsewhere was--

_CROWLEY,_ purred the _VOICE_ at whose feet he had landed. _SO GOOD OF YOU TO JOIN US. JUST AS I NEEDED TO MAKE AN EXAMPLE._

The wine decided that no matter what a horror it had been, it didn't deserve this. Inebriation abandoned Crowley along with all hope. Instinctively he tried to prostrate himself further, although he hadn't yet risen. Better to smash his face into the floor than to catch more than a glimpse. "Lord," he said, or tried to. 

_NONE OF THAT. UP YOU GET. SHOW SOME PRIDE IN YOUR WORK._

Crowley's body twisted upward. "My work, Lord," he said. It was probably for the best that he couldn't make it come out as a question, or with any inflection at all. He felt like he was standing beside a blast furnace. That all that Light wasn't directed at him didn't lessen his appreciation of how it might, with the slightest adjustment in angle, send him up like a lightning-struck pine tree. The Court of Hell cowered before Him. Even Prince Beelzebub bowed down. 

_YOU OFFER ME THE TORMENTED SOUL OF A SINGLE SUICIDE, DUKE HASTUR? LOOK UPON THIS SERPENT, LOWEST OF THE LOW. HE DAMNED TWO WHOLE CITIES THIS WEEK ALONE! HE SO CORRUPTED THEM THAT THE A̶NG̷E̸LS SMOTE THEM FROM THE FACE OF THE EARTH RATHER THAN FACE THEIR FAILURES. AND SO ARE T̡HE ҉LIES ͢O̢͞F̶ ̷̡͝T̴̸̕͜͞H̢͞E̶̛͘͢ ̶͘ÇR̸E҉̷̧A̧̨͜T̸͞͡O͡͝R҉̢ ͠͡͏ ̷R̡͏EV̛E̕͘A̵̶ĻE̸̡̨D͘͘,͘҉ ͏T͠HA̧̨҉T ̵̵S̴͡H̶̢҉Ȩ͢ ̢͟͟ ̸W͏̡O̵͞͡U̵͢LD̴ BREA̶̵K̶̡͝ ͘͘A̕L̴̨͘L͏͏ ͜H̸͠E͏̡̡͞R̷̵ ͏̷P̢R̵̛O̸͟͜M͏͟͡I̢̨̛͡Ş̶҉E͟҉S͢͞ ̴̕͜͜O͘F̵̧͝ ̶̡͘̕͠R̴̢̕Ą͞I̴̷͝͠N̡͏S̵͡҉ ̶̧̛A̸̷͟͜N̴D҉̕͝͠ ̕B̶͘͢͟O̴҉͘͘W̨̡͢͡Ş̵̛͝ ̷̴͘A̷̢̨̢Ņ̶͘͢D̶͢͢͜ ̶̡͘P̢̧͘̕̕͡R̴̸̵̵̷̡̛O̷̷͘͢͠͠V̶̶̢̨̢͘Ę̷̧̛͘͞ ̵̨͘͢͝͡͝F̴̶̸̡͟͢҉Ą̵̡͟͜͟͝I̡̛̛͘͢͠͝T̴̶̴̛͢͝͝H̢͜͝҉҉̡͡L̴̷̷̡͠҉E̴̸̸͘͢͜͢S͘҉̧͢҉̶̷S̸̷̨̨͘͜͠ ̴̴̛͘͡͡҉I͟͞҉͜͝͡N̶̡͘͘͟͞͡ ̸̴̢̨̛̕͝H̵͞҉̷̨͘͘E̷̸̷̷̡͢͡Ŗ̷͘͘̕͢͝ ̴̵̨͘̕҉̷C̶̵̢̛͜͠͝Ǫ̷̸̷̵̢̫͚͉͌͗͂̂̾̕͜ͅ҉̸̸̴̶̷̧̥̱̬̱̓͒̑͌̅̕V̶̶̢̬̹̟̜̓͠҉̸̴̶̶̴̡̙͈͙̝͉͊̿͌̂́̏͡҉̶͇͑Ẽ̸̴̵̵̶̸̵̡̢̢̨̡̛͚̳͙͕̩͔̲͔̑̾̈́͑̓̆͐̉̕̚͟͝͡͞Ǹ̸̶̶̷̵̸̵̴̴̢̢̨̨̧̛̹̤̥̪̱͖͈̰̩̬͂͋̒͌͌̀̂͑͘͟͝͝Ą̵̴̴̶̴̸̴̶̶̷̢͔̯̦̘̯͈͚̼͉̫̅̋͑͛̍͐̌͘͘͝͠͝N̶̶̶̷̶̵̶̸̡̛̠͓̣̹̦͇͈̝͈͊̏̇̈́͑̽̈̔̽͘̕͜͢͜͟͝͞͞T̷̸̶̶̸̵̵̶̸̵̢̧̡̨̰̹̮͍̲̥͖̱͑͛̈́͑͊̊̆͑̇̔̕̚͡͝͡͡Ş̴̵̵̷̶̵̵̶̧̢̡̢̛͔̤͎̫͇̬̲̺̊̈̋̆̊̈́̍̇̚͜͠ͅ-̷̶̸̴̵̵̸̸̵̶̡̧̨͎͚̻͕̠̣̻̯̣̦͇̓̀̈́̒̔̓̒͒͂̔̕͘̕͡͠-̸̷̷̵̶̷̡̬̬͕͚͚̞͛̾̏͗̈́҉̴̴̴̷̛͓̪̜̖̅̄̾_

The _SOUND_ burned through Crowley's ears, wrapped itself around the inside of his skull, and squeezed. Crowley swayed and focused very, very hard on the ground, and thought thoughts about being small and crawly and of no real importance and nothing that needed to be noticed at all. 

It was endured, as the humans might endure a typhoon. At length the intensity of the Light was attenuated, the angle shifted. Words began to come clearly once more through the furious Meaning. 

_\--HOW IT IS DONE, CROWLEY._

"My Lord?" he croaked. His throat was dry, as if he'd been the one doing the shouting. Or screaming. 

_COME FORWARD,_ commanded the Lightbringer, calm now. Almost fond, inasmuch as a typhoon could be fond of anything. _THE COURT REQUIRES A DEMONSTRATION, MY DARLING._

_SHOW ME HOW YOU SOWED THE RUIN OF SODOM AND GOMORRAH._

"Er," said Crowley. "Um. Well." 

Crowley had _liked_ Gomorrah. He really had. Sodom was pretty great, too. He wouldn't have spent a week getting drunk in the most decrepit backwater he could find if he'd been pleased to see them go. Right now, though, he could wish that they'd been wiped off the map a hundred years earlier, when he'd been busy with that side-trip to Greece and a thousand miles away. 

(Four millenia later he'd remember this feeling and invest in an HR consultancy business based on how to best inspire it in helpless corporate drones. It was wildly successful at securing souls for Hell on both sides of the management-workforce divide, but after six months he couldn't take it anymore, burned down the head offices, and framed the CEO for insurance fraud.)

In what would one day be a time-honoured tradition of the working peon, Crowley opened his mouth and prepared to bullshit wildly. Then a real miracle occurred: he realized he didn't need to. 

"You sssee," he said, and the snake slipped into his syllables. "It's about denssssity." 

The crowd felt skeptical. Crowley swayed, and then made the motion deliberate, mesmerising. He dropped his voice. That side-trip to Greece had involved a lot of theatres, for some reason. (Ostensibly it had been research. The plenitude of alcohol was just blending in, honest. But he had learned _some_ things.)

"Humans these days are... small. Short-lived. They don't have much... bang, all on their own. This isn't 4000 BC anymore, you can't just get the first human you see to commit a murder and have that damn half the population." Forget that all he'd meant to do was encourage Cain to stick a couple frogs in that fat-head Abel's bed, or something similarly delinquent. It had been a long time ago and Crowley had got a lot more used to blood in the time since; he was rarely even sick over it, anymore. "You have to make sure it's all set up for maximum impact. Cities, oh, they're the best. Like dominoes." 

"Like what?" somebody in the audience muttered. Crowley felt Attention turn in that direction, and shuddered. The Court went dead silent. 

_Simple,_ he reminded himself. _Keep it simple. They're a thousand years behind the times and dominoes aren't due to be introduced for another couple millennia._

"It's like fission," said Crowley. "A spare neutron bouncing around isn't going to do much good, it's just a spare neutron. But clump some 235U together and _then_ set that neutron loose, and..." 

_BANG._

"Yes! Yes, exactly." 

Crowley grinned, tasting success, and made a stupid, fatal mistake: he let his gaze flick up toward the throne. 

Lucifer had always been popular in Heaven, Before. Part of it was the popularity that inevitably was bestowed upon the best-looking person around, but that wasn't all of it. When Lucifer talked to you, he was never talking _at_ you. Take that wanker Gabriel: it was always obvious that whenever he wasn't the one talking, he was thinking about what he was going to say next. Lucifer wasn't like that. Lucifer actually listened, and when he listened, he gave you the full and undivided attention of the force that had ignited the stars. It was enough to make an angel feel like the most important being in the universe. 

Here in Hell where He was Lord and Master, it had a rather more pronounced effect on a demon. 

Lucifer was looking directly at Crowley, eyes bright with fond interest, and Crowley hadn't felt so Listened to in an Age. Not since before. Not since _this angel_, Before. Crowley's whole body swayed forward, an entirely involuntary movement that he wouldn't have checked even if he had noticed. All that Attention directed solely at him was headier than any quantity of wine: all that Listening, and if he could only put it the right way then Lucifer would understand, would sympathize. And oh, how Crowley wanted His sympathy--he wanted to show Him, he wanted to explain, he wanted--

He hadn't noticed how near he'd approached to the Throne, drawn in by the Lightbringer like a bewildered moth. He noticed when his knees gave out. Hands outstretched, he clutched at Lucifer's bare foot, feeling the heatless Light beneath blaze forth and through his own corporation. It was merciless; if he tried to hide it would find and destroy him, and it took all he had not to pull back, screaming. All he had, and nothing at all. He could not have let go for anything short of a direct command. He couldn't have borne it. 

Crowley moistened his lips. He'd lost the thread, a bit. He had to tie it all back together. He had to find the right way to put it. 

"They get curious," he said, all raw honesty beneath his Lord's gaze, the highest possible praise that could be offered by an angel who had Fallen for a _Why?_ "A few examples in the right place, and they start doing it to themselves. Then better. They get inventive." 

Silence. Awful silence, and beneath it Crowley bowed his head to Lucifer's foot, pressed his forehead against skin that was very much not skin. It was frozen Light and it felt like a brand. It hurt like one. If he poured himself into that Light it would burn him up as swift as any moth, and there was something _oh_-so tempting in that thought, Eden's apples had nothing on it. Wouldn't it be worth it, to make one brilliant flash before going out--?

_GO ON,_ said the _VOICE._

He wasn't looking at the Lightbringer's eyes anymore, and that made it slightly harder to ignore the hysterical voice in the back of his head, shrieking for self-preservation. Crowley swallowed, mouth dry. No way out but through. If that. 

"I showed them thiss, Lord," he hissed. His mouth was too dry to make it come out properly. No matter, he told himself. It wasn't about what he had to say. It was in the curve of his spine as he knelt up and then forward, draping his forearm across Lucifer's knee, light pressure, no pressure at all, nudging His legs further apart. It was in the sinuous bend of his neck, as he raised his head so far and no further, not daring to turn his face toward those eyes. But he couldn't keep his own eyes averted: he gazed upward at his Lord, at the source of all his continued existence, and _yesss_, he wanted, and now would be a damn good time to show it, so he did. He couldn't have helped but show it. 

"Just this," he said breathlessly, demure as he looked upward through thick lashes. He knew what a picture he painted. It was all of it true in this moment, and he was a wretched creature indeed. He paused, throwing caution to the wind long enough to miracle his voice back under control: still breathless, but now low and throaty. It came out more sinfully full than he'd been aiming for, washed by the Light he was bathing in. "And then, to another, I intimated that it was forbidden." 

_MY CLEVER LITTLE SERPENT._

The force of Lucifer's delight was like an imploding star, dragging Crowley inexorably forward. He twined between Lucifer's legs, coiling in his limbs to settle there. Skin-to-not-skin (it certainly wasn't clothing, and where had Crowley's gone?), concepts flowed and mingled, and Crowley could feel _HIM_, could catch the shallowest of His thoughts, a trans-harmonic cacophony that instantly liquified his corporation's brain. His metaphysical thoughts fared only a little better. Things he could vaguely recognize stood out here and there: himself, from Another's point of view, desperate curious vulnerable clever wanting arrogant _fond--_Attention snagged there, examining that with the beginnings of fury. Fondness for those creatures that He so despised? _Sorrow?_

Desperation panic yearning--

_GO ON,_ the _VOICE_ repeated, amusement undercutting the earlier interest. It carried with it a whiff of a razor, the edge of a cliff. 

Helplessly Crowley leaned forward the last few inches, and took Him into his mouth. 

If mere touch had been overwhelming, then attempting to envelope some portion of Lucifer's essence was a step beyond. On the least metaphysical of planes Crowley wrapped what could approximate a tongue around something that might be considered a cock; if the tongue wrapped rather further than any human tongue, then that was not unprecedented by Crowley's corporation; if the cock was rather larger than any human cock, then it yet did not adequately convey the scale and density of essence that was causing Crowley to choke. He could taste the tang of iron from the drainage pools in Pandemonium. Shivers wracked him as the cold of Dis leached through his tongue, into his skull, spreading thence to the rest of his bones. It felt like Hell was trying to fit Itself inside him, and Crowley could only shudder and let it. 

No, he realized, as his self-preservation sighed and gave him up as a bad job. He was sucking it all in, as wantonly as he'd sucked any cock--moreso. It might have been his own desire, or it might have been the monstrous Will that held him pinned and crooned _Let's see the art of these _things_ you're so fond of_. Perhaps both. (Perhaps both were one and the same.)

Crowley moaned and bobbed his head, trying to recollect some of that art for himself. He was botching it, he knew. He couldn't think. He took in Lucifer's cock to the hilt and let his tongue flicker out to tease along and behind testes that hadn't been manifested before Crowley expected them there. Desire and sensation flowed both ways, and that was his only possible salvation, but he couldn't seem to get it under control. Couldn't find the right way to put it, to _explain_. Sour wine, ill-made by inexperienced vintners. Laughter, and stinking bodies doubled over with mirth. The scrape of a strigil over skin. Fingers combing through hair, massaging the scalp, professionally pinpointing all those beguiling corporeal nerves. 

The slave wielding that strigil, later beaten to death by his master, who the next day was heralded the wisest man in the city. The baker's wife who pinched away dough, then gave her largesse to the urchins who haunted her stoop. The child who stoned a fox to death for sport but wept for days when his loyal hound died, and buried him with full offerings. The slave's grave was nearby, unmarked. 

It all came through twisted. Lucifer cared nothing for any of it. Crowley could feel His interest waning, and with it His tolerance. And he was growing lightheaded; without a living corporation he had no need to breathe (not that there was any air about, anyway), but that much Light was beginning to have secondary effects. 

Crowley pulled off and rested his cheek against the inside of Lucifer's thigh, panting. He felt stretched out of shape, like a deflated balloon. 

His breath coalesced in a sheen over shimmering skin. Crowley nosed inward, down to the base of Lucifer's cock, and breathed more condensation, then licked it away. His tongue was clumsy and numb; his lips chafed with frost-burn. Lucifer burned cold. For a human Crowley could yet have made it gratifying on physical sensation alone, with his hands if not his mouth, but here that wasn't going to do. Panic scrabbled at the back of his brain, hard enough now to be distracting from the Lightbringer's effervescence. 

_OH, COME HERE._ Lucifer reached down, so deceptively gentle that when Crowley blinked, he couldn't be sure it wasn't genuine. He knew it couldn't be. This was the gentleness of a knife so sharp that it was impossible to feel going in; one only realized it as the world grew dark and dim, life-blood having poured out of the unnoticed wound. Crowley was dizzy already, slithering up the planes of His form. He could have stood on his own. Physically, he still had the strength. What he lacked was the willpower, and it left him pressed against Lucifer's chest. The cold sunk into him, and reached a depth where it transformed into a peculiar warmth. Crowley shivered, feverish. 

_YOU'VE NEVER DISAPPOINTED ME BEFORE,_ Lucifer murmured. His breath tickled the top of Crowley's ear. At this proximity, the force of His _VOICE_ finished what their earlier contact had begun: Crowley's dead corporation crisped and atomized. Stray left-over neutrons took one look at the situation and attempted to flee. Most failed. There was no fission here: Lucifer's Presence put the strong nuclear force to shame, and woe betide any particle caught in the radius of that brilliance. _IF YOU THINK THERE'S SOMETHING TO THEM, THEN SHOW ME. I KNOW YOU CAN DO IT, DARLING._

Crowley was hazily aware he'd had a plan, but it seemed to have been discorporated along with his brain. The extreme heat--cold?--whichever--was making it impossible to think. Bereft of further direction, he fell back on the basics of what to do when sitting stark naked in somebody else's likewise-naked lap. Lucifer's mouth seemed both too far away and frightening, so kissing was out, but His cock was right there. Crowley pressed his cheek to Lucifer's collarbone, breathing in the scent of divinity wafting from His skin (not-skin, but everything was translating to base desire now), and struggled to push himself just far enough back that he could work his hands down between them, an agony of separation. His fingers curled around Lucifer's cock and stroked. 

The results were hardly all that could be hoped for. No wonder; Crowley's fingers felt clumsy, both numb and oversensitive at once, and he kept twitching spasmodically as pinpricks tingled across his skin where it contacted Lucifer's. Not that it was skin, exactly, that either of them now wore. Although if Crowley's was so swiftly gaining pinholes, soon his wouldn't be much of anything...

_I REFUSE TO BELIEVE THIS IS THE BEST YOU CAN DO._ Lucifer's sigh curled sub-arctic wind through Crowley's hair and down across his shoulders, but it was the words that made Crowley wilt. His Lord's disappointment cast a pall heavier than anything possible on the mortal plane: if Lucifer had tossed him out of His lap and stepped on him, he'd have felt less like a squirming lowly thing. _WHAT DO YOU NEED? HOW CAN I HELP YOU DO BETTER? ...PERHAPS SOME ADDITIONAL MOTIVATION IS REQUIRED._

"N-no, no, I can--" 

Lucifer placed His palm against Crowley's spine. The wings that Crowley usually kept hidden were drawn out, spread across several points of view and states of existence with a casual stroke, and Lucifer ran His fingers through feathers shaped from gossamer soul-stuff. It had much the same effect as a lightning bolt to the brain--or to the cock. Crowley cried out and slipped forward. Some still-aware part of him shrieked alarm that this was another demon (_the_ Demon, the Devil himself, beyond any mere imp's comprehension and mostly beyond Crowley's, too) and He had His hand on Crowley's wings. If He wanted, He could exert the slightest amount of pressure, and oh, yes, it would _hurt_\--it would hurt because it would be crippling, it would hurt with the urgency required only by pain points that needed to notify the user to _stop right this instant, what the fuck do you think you're trying?_ If he'd dared, Crowley would have twisted away and fled. He didn't. 

Then those sinfully artful fingers crooked and his vision whited out. An avalanche of molten bliss drove all fear from his mind, and indeed eradicated all other thought as well. Crowley pressed his mouth against Lucifer's skin, kissing upward sloppily and frantically toward His neck, suckling at the Light He radiated, the most pathetic attempt at expressing the sensation that Lucifer caused with every twitch of His fingers, a pathetic cry for _more, oh my Lord, please_. Was this what those first stars felt, to be kindled by such hands? It couldn't be. They'd have all gone nova. 

_How could any mortal arts compare to that touch?_

He barely knew what he was doing anymore as he raised himself up, except that he wanted, _wanted_, and now here he was in Lucifer's lap with Lucifer's hand in his wings and he could not climb down to take His cock back into his mouth, so he took it with his body. In this, the lack of a corporation worked to his benefit (or, perhaps, to his extreme detriment), as there were no physical considerations required and thus the affair could proceed without further delay. He sank down, gasping into Lucifer's neck as he felt the frost-fire burn of it, and then it was inside him and oh, oh, it was too much. He was already scrambled. He had no mental defences left to stand between his self and the unaccountable vastness of Hell. The screaming torments of ten million demons and three times that many human souls pierced through him like razor-wire, and Crowley's whole being spasmed and clenched down. 

One sharp fang broke through skin at Lucifer's neck, just barely. A taste like nirvana flooded Crowley's mouth. It was power, it was clarity, it was the pride of knowing one was right and the rage of being wronged. It was lust for glory and lust for love and lust for attention, and a hatred that could only come of being spurned. It was a loathing that would never cease. 

The hand in his wings twisted with displeasure. 

Delicate structures snapped. Hell sang out all its agonies from the broken points, with Crowley's shriek rising above the chorus. Joined as they were he caught the back-echo as well, the Notice taken of his sudden descent into purest pain. His mind swam with a tide of hungry interest that rose and kept him pinned like a butterfly, as for the first time Lucifer found these proceedings worthy of the Attention He'd been giving them. Lucifer's other hand stroked up Crowley's back as well, to his other wing, and Crowley wept as Lucifer's essence thickened within him. Inescapable. 

_AHHH,_ said Lucifer, with a rolling wave of satisfaction that hit Crowley with much the same effect as that first gentle touch against his wings. _**NOW** I SEE WHAT YOU FIND SO FASCINATING ABOUT THIS._

Lucifer's other hand closed, and soul-shattering pain arched across Crowley's wings again. He did not manage to scream. Nonsensical sounds spilled forth from his mouth entirely without his consent. Without a corporation, he didn't have the luxury of passing out. He could only experience: those hands gripping his wings _so_ gently once more; that rising tide of Light filling him up; and his own equivalent of a cock sitting untouched between their not-exactly-bodies, hard as granite and growing harder every time his jolting, involuntary twinges sent fresh torment down his spine and into his core: Lucifer liked this, oh yes, and what He liked, so perforce did Crowley. 

"Please," Crowley croaked. The vibrations of his own voice only increased the excruciation of his broken wings. "Lord..."

_OF COURSE, PET. I CAN TAKE CARE OF THIS PART._

When Lucifer lifted him, he found he could yet scream after all. Essence tore like tendons. The broken jagged edges of bone-equivalents ground against softer pieces of his being, cutting and breaking. Lucifer captured his mouth with His own and breathed in the scream and a good deal of Crowley's sense of self, besides. He felt it go and had no time to be concerned, because Lucifer pulled him back down and thrust up with His hips, replacing the space He'd made with Light, vaster and denser than Crowley could properly contain. And then He did it _again_\--and again, and again, wicked delight building with every repeat of the cycle, as the dual agony and ecstasy merged closer each time until Crowley no longer knew the difference. Every thrust was the exquisite subsumption of his infernal soul. Every withdrawal was void-wrought despair. Details blurred: ragged ripped ligaments might have been the stinking, sulfurous wind over the plains of Tartarus. The writhing sinners of the second circle overtook the aching sweet unrelease that was Crowley's own cock. Broken feathers fell like ash over Hades. Pulled between extremes, Crowley's mind thinned and ballooned until it popped, and as he broke he felt the triumph of an all-devouring Presence roaring to completion. 

Motion ebbed and ceased. As far as Crowley was concerned, so did Time itself. 

The _VOICE_ washed over him, thunder and heat, but he was beyond understanding. He knew only that there was another withdrawal--and no return. Nothingness. He was set aside. Involuntary responses had various bits of him twitching, scrabbling as existing damage was compounded by impact against the throneroom floor, but he registered none of it. He was empty. 

His Lord had discarded him. He was Falling.

He had no ability to conceive of time passing. There was only empty eternity, and that was not so much within his comprehension as inescapable. But as it had since the First Day, whether he processed it or not Time did continue to move forward, or at least not backward. The first that Crowley became aware of it again was when a slow-rising vibration and heat concentrated about one of the many broken bone-like structures of his wings. He cried out at the sensation of something like a welding torch--and then the broken edges melted and fused together, repaired, and the shocking absence of that point of agony--the change in sensation--cut through him. His whole being shuddered and spasmed with something that might have been pain, might be pleasure, but was mostly just too much. 

In the movement his wrecked consciousness brushed against something _else_, something here with him in his state of desolate abandonment, and when another piece of broken bone was heated and restored and made him shake all over again, he realized he was no longer empty. A thousand tiny crawling things had curled up inside him, pushing at his metaphysical flesh and keeping him from imploding into nothing. He could feel their many-legged forms wriggling through him, situating themselves about his own ruined, larger one. After those first two successes they began to work in earnest: the scissoring teeth of hornets sawed away unsalvageable tissue, the chomping mandibles of horseflies carried broken pieces into position, and a conscripted army of Japanese honey bees vibrated and died to provide the heat to weld. 

Crowley seized, a wail caught frozen in his ruined throat. It was being unmade in reverse, except worse, because he couldn't even fly apart beneath it. His entire being was very firmly caged. Generations of insects pinned to corkboards had their preemptive revenge upon human-shaped creatures, nailing him to immutable stone. He shuddered without room to writhe, screamed without voice, and could do nothing and go nowhere as he was remade in tormented ecstasy amidst a deep, furious buzz. 

When it was done and he was released, Crowley was still not yet at the point of processing anything else. He blinked dazedly at the ceiling. It was very low and covered in drippy pipes. As he watched, a large drop of slimy water condensed on a pipe right above his head, and eventually released, plonking down right between his eyes. He flinched from the odd mundanity of the sensation. It felt muted. 

He did recognize where he was. At another time he might have been nervous at being in his direct boss' rarely seen personal office, but at the present he was rather too exhausted, and also far more terrified by the realization of his stunningly intimate position in regards to the many-legged multitude that was the dreaded Prince of Flies. 

"It zzzeems he was pleazzzzed with you," said a buzzing voice from a thousand mouths. "Any more pleazed, and I might not have been able to restructure you, and then he would be displeazed with me. And that would make me _very_ displeazzzzed with what was left of you."

Crowley licked his lips. He took a breath, experimentally, and winced as he felt _things_ crawling out of him, abandoning him to continue his existence on his own. Well, him and the dead honey bees. It zzee--he shook off the lingering buzz from his thoughts and tried to think more snakey. It sseemed Beelzebub thought he could deal with the remaining damage himself. Or if he couldn't, it wasn't their problem. Fortunately, while breathing hurt, it was doable. If he got a couple days' sleep first, he could probably even stand up. 

"I sssee," he said. "Er, yeah. Got it."

Beelzebub pulled themzelves into a more singular semi-corporation. Her expression was as annoyed and unimpressed as ever, which somehow was ridiculously comforting and made Crowley want to cry. "You'd better hope zzo. He'zzz indicated He'll be conducting your zzentennial reviewz from now on." 

Perhaps his estimation of his ability to breathe had been over-optimistic. There was an odd whining noise coming from his throat. 

A small finger with a boil on one knuckle pointed at the door. "Get out." 

Crowley crawled out.

**Author's Note:**

> I don't even know, don't ask me.


End file.
